Song of Corruption
by Butterbells of Death
Summary: You find a note on the ground. You read it. You discover that something very exciting is happening somewhere very far away from where you are. You muse to yourself that this exciting something will most likely include many humorous antics, some epic battles, a bit of blood here and there, and will definitely be romantic in some way or other... Quite the imagination you have there.
1. Prologue

TST 1 asdf tkelSDCW

TST 2 poi dview ERfeQE

Test run, can anyone read this? Whatever, I'll just assume you can.

Ahem.

To whoever reads this message, I hope you are an avid player of pokemon. Emphasis on _avid, player, _and _pokemon_. As in, pokemon the video game, and you are a skilled enough player of said game. Preferably, you (the reader of this note) is either a knowledgeable competitive battler or an experienced ROM hacker.

If you feel that you do _not _fulfill the criteria above, I recommend that you pass this note on to someone who _does_. Of course, even if you don't fulfill the criteria, feel free to read this note anyway, but I warn you in advance that what you read will most likely appear to be gibberish otherwise.

Anyway, now that the formalities are out of the way, it's time for me to tell you my story.

It all started with a simple trip to the nearest game store. I came in to sell some of my unused games and maybe buy some new ones when one of the clerks suddenly came up to me.

This particular clerk was an acquaintance of mine, he knew what I did in my spare time, so he made me an offer. He offered to give me a secondhand copy of pokemon black 2 for free.

I asked why; it seemed a little shady. All he said was that the game was broken and I would have more use for it than anyone else.

I asked him 'broken how?' and he told me that the data was corrupted. Hacked, was the word he used.

That piqued my interest. I haven't seen a hacked version of any of the generation 5 games at the time, so I was eager to take a shot at it. I'm sure there were plenty swimming somewhere online, but I was too lazy to search one out.

Timeskip further ahead to when I got back to my house.

The game by the way, was in cartridge form. So I could play it on my DS regularly.

I start the game.

Several minutes in and everything seemed normal.

The first sign of something being off was when I got to Bianca to pick out my starter. Her dialogue was off. Like, _way _off. I can't remember what it was she said exactly, but it sounded kinda ominous. I think it went,

"So you've come [PLAYER]. Do you want to go on another challenge? A path of conquest? To gather yet another army of fell beasts?"

Don't quote me on this, my memory's not the best. I just remember there being a lot of questions and some pretty prose-y wordplay. Some flowery insults were there too but I can't remember how they went.

Bianca was a major contrast compared to her original counterpart.

Next thing that was obviously not right were the starters.

(This is a pretty common thing in hacks. Rarely anyone ever uses the usual starters. But how they hacked this part of the game was especially mind-blowing in my opinion.)

Somehow, they managed to fit 16 choices of starters. One for every element bar dragon. I mean, they managed to perfectly mimic the 3D pokeballs of the starter menu choice and everything. Even re-structured the whole thing to make it look like all the pokeballs were looping upwards like a gigantic ferris-wheel.

It showed that this guy knew how to animate, to script, program etc. A lot of work for a simple hack.

I don't remember what each of the starters were, though I think they were all pretty sub-par. I just remember that I chose the poison starter, gulpin.

I don't particularly like gulpin, I just felt like using a poison pokemon as my starter.

From there on, the game's script was identical to the original, save for the random encounters. It was one of those typical 'able to catch all pokemon' hacks.

I got to around the second gym before my curiosity got the best of me. This game was pretty interesting, I couldn't resist the urge, I just _had _to tear it apart for the resources.

So I do just that. I whip out my card reader, put the game in, and proceed to very carefully crack the cartridge (not literally, I mean crack the cartridge's programming so I could read it with a computer).

Once that was done, I open one of my ROM altering programs.

I have several of those. One in particular was of my own creation, the result of cannibalizing several small-time pokemon hacking programs for resource/reference. Pretty proud of it actually, my pokemon ROM altering program. I uploaded it on mediafire, but I doubt anyone's ever run across it yet. It had a non-indicative name; 'ROLYGON Ver 1.3.1'

...Don't ask me why I called it ROLYGON.

ANYWAY, I tried opening the black 2 hack with ROLYGON and was surprised to find that it was not supported. As in, I couldn't open it.

That was a bummer, since it meant the guy never used the basic pokemon template to begin with, or he/she'd tampered with it to the point that it was unreadable. Plus the fact that I cracked the cartridge? That meant I couldn't run the game anymore. Not on my DS at least.

_Ah well, I could still play the .nds game on an emulator _I thought to myself.

Now this was where things got really weird.

I ran the thing on an emulator, and the game screen suddenly freaks out on me. Ever run terminal or command prompt? Yeah, the game screen suddenly looked like that. With a bunch of long lines moving too fast for me to read.

But after it was done running... whatever the hell it was running, the screen suddenly prompts a question.

I remember the question perfectly.

"BE DEAD? Y/N"

Obviously, I answered NO!

Shit was creepy enough as is.

But after I answered, the game screen tells me an error and another question gets prompted.

"BE REBORN? Y/N"

Once again, I say no.

Unfortunatle, the game _yet again_ gives me an error message. But this time, the same question gets prompted.

"BE REBORN? Y/N"

A couple more times I say fucking _no_. But the thing was looping back, constantly asking me whether or not I would like to _be reborn_.

At some point I finally went _fuck it _and tried to just close the emulator window.

Surprise surprise, the game won't fucking let me. The window just won't close.

Figured this was an error, so I try to turn the power off.

Still didn't work.

I'd pull the plug on the power or something, but I was using a laptop. I'd also eject the battery, but the eject button's been jammed for ages. Taking out the battery would risk me never being able to put it back on ever again.

So finally, I fucking cave and answered Y.

And then... I died.

LOL J/K

I wouldn't be able to write this if I'd died lol.

Nah, I just got reborn.

Into a pokemon.

Yup.

...

Seriously, I'm like, a pokemon now.

I shit you not, I really _did _turn into a freaking pokemon!

And, believe it or not, that's the end of the story.

I'm not even sure if anyone's able to get their hands on this note. I gave this note to my mistress' kadabra after I heard a rumor that they could 'teleport through dimensions'.

Frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if this note got teleported to a desert in the middle of nowhere, but still totally in THIS dimension. The pokemon dimension, I mean.

So yeah. I guess that ends this note?

Moral of the story? Black 2 is shit, all the cool pokemon are on White 2.

PS. I now have a new appreciation for the existence of opposable thumbs. Or at least, fingers. I wish I still had fingers (;_;)

PSS. If the person who reads this is actually someone who lives in the pokemon world, please simply assume that this note was written by a nutjob with schizophrenia or something.

**xxx**

**A/N: I'm doing rebirth fics now!**

**Cookie goes to anyone who can guess what the MC got turned into, HINT: he has no fingers.**


	2. one-princess army Ia

I always find these new sensations so intriguing.

From one point to another, it's as if you spend a second in one place, blink, and then find yourself in another place entirely. Contrary to, what I believe is, popular belief, you neither feel an indefinitely torturous time in a dark, sealed cage nor do you spend the time in some imaginary fabricated worlds.

The most accurate way to describe it would be simply 'a void of sensation'.

A sensation that is lacking in any sensation. Something indescribable, how else can you describe feeling _a lack _of feeling?

That is, more or less, what you feel when inside a pokeball. Really, you feel nothing. And perhaps that's the most jarring thing of all- to some, I find myself completely indifferent to the experience save for a sense of mildly sated curiosity from the experience.

Odder still than the sensation of lacking sensation would probably be the interesting new way this foreign body of mine processes what used to be familiar experiences.

Such as this, the breeze of wind.

This new body processes the information of my 'skin' differently. I know there's a current of air passing through me, my brain can recognize that. But the fact that my brain recognizes something I think is supposed to be a familliar sensation differently _despite the fact that I have memory of feeling said sensation before... _it's a tad disorienting to say the least.

Like a before or after kind of thing. At one second you eat a cookie and taste chocolate, but the next second you eat the same cookie but taste vanilla. You recognize the fact, but it's still puzzling.

Luckily, orienting with my new body is actually much easier than you'd think as long as I don't think about it too hard. It's as if my new body was installed with some kind of 'auto-pilot' system that gets overruled whenever I try to do something manually by thinking about it too hard.

Thankfully, I've had roughly a month to get used to this body and I'd like to imagine that I've gotten the hang of it.

I feel like smiling at myself all of a sudden, for no reason I'm aware of.

A shame I no longer have a mouth to smile _with_. But surprisingly enough, I overall find myself quite fond of this new body, more so than my old one now that I've gotten used to it, though it's regrettable that I've lost a certain number of luxury functions.

Speaking of functions, I have _not _lost the function of hunger. Indicative by the fact that I currently find myself absolutely _famished_.

My mind may have been inactive during my stay in the pokeball's containment, but the service didn't seem to extend to my physical body. By how hungry I am now, I realize that I must have been inside of there for _much_ longer than I thought.

Looking around, I can see that we are clearly in some kind of forest. The light is barely managing to penetrate the thick foliage around us, but the fact that any is getting through at all is indicative of the time. Most likely somewhere around mid-day by my estimation.

We are currently in what barely constitutes as an opening in the forest. More root than ground underfoot (not that I _have _feet).

Now as much as I would _love _to cleave through the nearest sad motherfucker, the mistress would make me pay _very dearly _should I leave on a hunting excursion without her permission. She's strict like that and I had to learn the hard way.

I look around the clearing.

Sitting cross legged while floating is number eleven the kadabra, playing with her spoon while a trio of berries circle above her like a halo, eyes closed in concentration. Slightly away from her is #26 the tyrogue, punching away at a tree bark as if for dear life.

And there she was, right behind number twenty-six was the mistress. Extremely notable in how she carries herself so gracefully, with a straight posture that suggested she was a dancer or some sort. And despite being as vertically challenged as she is, she somehow manages to come across as a figure of great authority.

Her hair was bleached and today she had it in a high ponytail, falling just around the base of her neck. She wore one of those coats with furred collars and denim shorts. They showed off her legs down until her combat boots.

"What poor form twenty-six, do it like I showed you," she admonishes the tyrogue.

Twenty-six grunts a pained response before redoubling his efforts.

I interrupt milady's training session with a tap to her shoulder with my... cloth-like appendage. She turns around and glares at me with narrow eyes.

"What?" she asks. Surprising in how commanding she can sound despite being prepubescent. ...She is prepubescent right? What age do girls start getting their 'chocolate days'?

"You're spacing out again, focus twenty-three."

Oh, right.

I float around her shoulder height, perform a spin in mid-air, and then proceed to stab at the bark of the nearest tree.

"A hunt?" she crosses her arms and nods, "very well, but return within the next hour, you will be holding melee combat lessons with twenty-six."

With my scarf/cloth/appendage-thing, I salute at her and chuckle with my raspy, guttural voice.

She continues to glare at me, completely unamused.

_Oh come now milady, no need to look so murderous, _is what I'd say to her if I could talk.

But I can't. So I just float away quietly.

**xxx**

Forests are home to many wild-life.

I am currently decreasing that population one by one.

I propel myself with my magic powers (seriously the only way I can describe it) and proceed to impale a nearby ratatta, but I continue with the momentum of my thrust until I have the rodent pinned to a tree.

The helpless pokemon scratches and bites at me feebly, succeeding only in thinning it's bones against my metal body.

It didn't hurt per se, but I could feel the damage from his struggles. It was tingly, and uncomfortable, and I didn't like it.

So I bitchslap him with my badass scarf.

But then he goes limp.

Shit.

Oh come on, I didn't even hit that hard! Don't go dying on me already!

I haven't even gotten the chance to suck the soul out of your body and leave you into an empty rotting husk!

That's like, the best part!

Whatever, I still have a bit of life-force before he drops dead entirely.

I wrap him up in my scarf and proceed to eat.

I can feel the cloth start to break apart around the edges and kinda seep into the rodent's skin. It's a lot like punching a thousand needles into someone simultaneously. But instead of injecting something, I'm actually sucking something out.

It's... it's not blood though, as far as I can tell. It's, as I said before, life-force. I feed on the life-force of things.

I can't think of any other way to describe it. It's like... something that kills you when you run out of it.

I've done preliminary tests before. I once tried eating one of my victims without mortally wounding him, and then I tried to dissect him, to see what I ate that killed him.

As far as I can tell, everything was in place. All his blood was there, organs too, but his heart just wasn't beating for some unknown reason.

So from that point I just call whatever substance I feed on as life-force. Since things seem to die by the time I'm done sucking it out of them.

The ratatta was pretty much half dead already, so I finished tapping him out quickly. Still wasn't enough though.

Needed to feed some more. But I think my hour's almost up.

I've learned never to disobey milady, it will only end up with me being in tremendous pain.

I look around me to find that I am, unfortunately, out of prey.

There _were _trees and plants all around me, and based on experience, I _can _eat their life-force. But again, speaking from experience, I've found that they taste positively _dreadful_. Plants, grass-types, and a number of poison-types taste absolutely _revolting_.

It's hard to explain how I taste now, on account that I lack a tongue, and therefore unable to describe tastes the same way as things with tongues, but just trust in the fact that there are some things I prefer _not_ to eat.

Luckily, I notice just in the nick of time that there was something above me. Something alive and edible.

A pidgey nest.

...That was located _really fucking high in the tree_.

I know I can float, and I acknowledge the fact that I'm doing so right now. But floating involves these foreign mechanics that come with rules that I also find myself unable to explain. Namely, I'm unable to float above a certain height above solid ground.

I couldn't measure it accurately, but I've found that I can float above any solid piece of material with a sufficiently wide surface area (around the size of an old laser disc), up to a height of roughly two meters (or around the length of my scarf when completely stretched).

But I've found that I can, with my magic powers (I'm starting to think it's like really weak telekinesis that only applies to myself), propel myself as if I'm jumping.

So I do that.

I try to jump up to the pidgey nest.

...But clearly no bird was stupid enough to nest anywhere at jumping range.

So it's time to actually make a smidgen of effort.

I jump up as high as I can, and simultaneously propel my scarf at the nearest branch, and wrap my scarf around it.

...I fail miserably on my first try.

...Also on the second try.

Finally, I succeed, and I proceed to pull the rest of my body up to the branch with my scarf. I 'safely' manage to heave myself on that branch and proceed to try and steady myself on it.

Once I found my balance on the branch, I propel myself with magic once again and wrap my scarf around a higher branch. I continue to do so until I finally reach the nest of pidgeys.

I peer with my one eye at the contents, and find myself being stared back by the terrified eyes of four very scared baby pidgeys.

As if on instinct, all the little baby pidgeys start to squeak for their mommy to come and save them from the _terrifying _monster/demon/ghost/sword thing.

Had I been a moral man, I would've left them alive and settled with eating the _putrid _life-force of the plants around us.

Had I been a sadistic monster, I would've strangled each one of them in front of their siblings and watch in glee as the light slowly leave their infantile little eyes.

I was neither, so I settle with some kind of middlepoint.

I eat three (quick and painlessly, no need to be a monster about it), leave one alive, and proceed to go on my merry way.

It's the sensible thing afterall, we generally want some of our prey to survive and reproduce so that they make more prey.

**xxx**

Somehow I managed to get back just in time,

"ROAAAAAAAR!"

-To find an angry ursaring in our campsite.

"...Fool."

-Locked in a headlock performed by milady.

Eleven was a little to the side, currently focusing her mind on pinning the ursaring's arms. At least, I think that's what she's doing based on the faint pink glow around the ursaring's limbs.

Twenty-six was nowhere to be found.

"...There you are twenty-three, right on time."

A month ago I would have found this scene to be utterly surreal. Now? It's mildly amusing at best.

"Twenty-six has fled, you and I shall pursue him."

She produces a knife out of her boots and proceeds to impale the ursaring through the skull. The giant bear goes limp immediately.

I don't bother to comment (I couldn't anyway, technically not) and opt to simply fly into her hand.

She clasps me by the hilt whilst I make myself comfortable in her grip. I also wrap my scarf around the length of her arm. With her other hand, she recalls eleven into her pokeball.

"Tch."

Not sure what happened while I was away, but milady sure looks awfully pissed.

I barely even knew him, but I feel kinda bad for twenty-six.

**xxx**

**In case you've gotten this far and still haven't figured it out, the MC is a honedge. The new ghost/steel sword pokemon from X and Y.**


	3. one-princess army Ib

_Light, my body was unbelievably so._

_Odd. Judging by the depressions in the earth that appear with my every step, I am actually significantly heavier than before._

_Confounding._

A thin layer of dark emerald mist swims around my body. As I run, cleaving past any tree, branch, and bush that obstructs my path, the mist with a green hue moves in manner like an incorporeal tendril. The tendrils occasionally seem to be licking at my surroundings, leaving a kind of dark afterimage floating in the air after every touch.

_Twenty three himself is equally confounding_._ Judging by the length, the long handle, cupped hilt, and the presence of a blunt ricossa (the area between the hilt and the blade) twenty three seems to be some kind of zweihander._

_A giant sword. If I were to set him (I assume) perpendicular to the ground, I suspect that he would be just around my height, 150-155cm._

_Most likely for aesthetic purposes, twenty three's blade is colored a dark shade of green. His pommel was also styled in the shape of an upside-down diamond._

_I would expect that twenty three was originally a ceremonial blade of some kind, that was then possessed by a ghost (facts to be confirmed, the existence of ghost as the departed spirit of someone once living or as an unidentified species of pokemon without a material form), thus creating number twenty three._

_Ludicrous, I should neither be able to lift him nor to actually use him as a cleaving weapon._

_Yet here I am, doing exactly that._

Out of the corner of my eye, a small purple object dashes between a pair of giant boulders.

_Target acquired_.

I approached closer but then discovered a problem. The boulder was too thick and the gap to small for me to squeeze through.

_Shame, I'll have to-_

A tingle in my arm prevents me from moving away. A buzzing is heard and before I knew it, a sizable chunk of the front boulder had been reduced to dust, leaving an opening large enough for me to easily walk through.

_What?_

Before I could even analyze the damage and deduce the cause, a cackling sound comes from the lowered blade in my left hand. Not quite like human laughter, but clearly was trying to emulate just that. What it really sounded was like carefully adjusted volumes of different clanging steel.

_Twenty three..._

_He moved my hand without my consent, at a speed too fast for my own mind to catch._

_Unnerving._

"...Dangerous."

Another mimic at laughter. No, chuckling would be more accurate.

I pass the boulders and return to my chase.

_Extremely dangerous._

_If he wanted to, twenty three could easily have me removed. I have insurances, but I suspect they would only succeed in merely denting him at best._

_I only have numbers eleven and six on hand with me, losing twenty three would be a sizable decrease in my offensive capabilities._

_If only number three..._

_Everything hinges on twenty six, I cannot let him run away and ruin everything!_

Again, I catch a glance of twenty six's small form dashing through foliage. With my free hand, I go to one of the pokeballs latched to my belt.

_Still not close enough_.

Vain attempt.

A quick slash with twenty three and a portion of the foliage was shredded and blown away.

_I notice, that some of the leaves that were shredded had not even so much as made contact with twenty three's blade. It seemed that contact was now no longer required. Twenty three seems to have picked up some dangerous tricks._

I continue to run, making sure to keep an eye on my surroundings to make sure I'm still on the right track.

_Footprints, marks, signs of anything disturbed. Missing anything is absolutely unacceptable._

Finally, we reach an opening from the thick forest. Twenty six becomes apparent, and he is faced with a problem.

_A dead end. A cliff face by the looks of it. I would deduce that the cliff is too loose to be scaled, twenty six's natural instincts are no doubt telling him the same thing._

"No escape."

Twenty six refuses to comply, opting to sprint away towards my left. Towards the thickness of the foliage, most likely in attempt to reach cover of some kind.

_Slow, far too slow_.

I throw a pokeball at an area in front of twenty six, he notices it just in time and stops in his tracks. Just in time to avoid the initial shockwave of an opening pokeball.

The pokeball flies back towards me. Released from it was a plant-like creature shaped like a bell with tendrils and leaves growing around it. The creature also had perfectly round eyes the size of oranges.

_Number six, the weepinbell._

"Cease and desist twenty six. I suggest- for your sake, that you return quietly."

_And if you could, I would have you explain yourself for fleeing from the ursaring attack. Panic? Cowardice?_

_That would be unfortunate._

_It would be difficult, but I'm quite sure I would be able to... dear, what's the word?_

_Oh yes._

_Remedy._

I recall twenty six back to his ball with the press of a button. His body language prior to the recall seemed to suggest either disagreement or frustration with his situation.

_...I can handle it_.

"Hey you!"

A voice. From my right... west, judging from the sky. Male, loud footsteps, mid-pubescent voice pitch.

_A 10-12 year old male, I assume is most likely a new trainer._

A figure comes to view from beyond the foliage.

_I knew it._

_Just his very appearance suggests inadequacy._

Out comes a boy around my height, wearing a jacket that is extremely inappropriate for forest treading. White sneakers, aviator shades, and wearing a belt full of pokeballs.

"What do you think you're doing?!" he demands.

_And his face... A shame, he would grow to be quite a looker._

"Excuse me-"

"I _saw _what just happened! You-! Threatening your own pokemon?!"

_He looks positively outraged. You'd never think that anyone so young would be able to have a face so red with rage_.

"I'll have you reported to the league for pokemon abuse! Tell me you're name!"

_Really? You just told me that you're hoping to 'report' me, and then you ask me for my name?_

_A real shame indeed._

Twenty three breaks out into laughter once more in my hand.

_What's so funny?_

_...It doesn't matter. I don't plan on entertaining this boy's nonsense._

Without a word, I recall number six, shoulder twenty three's weight on my shoulder, and walk away east.

"Hey- Stop!"

_Judging from the sun, I should still be capable of reaching town just short of nightfall. But by my calculations, I can't afford any kind of distraction._

I continue to walk east.

I can hear loud footsteps behind me.

_Following me? Unwise._

"Stop! You- you criminal! Felon! Thug! Ne'er do well!"

_'Ne'er do well?'_ _I am unfamiliar with that phrase._

_But it sounds sufficiently ridiculous._

I notice something. An irregular displacement in the air around me,

_A gust of wind?_

_No_.

I stop.

_A pokeball!_

Twenty three reacted before I could. He props himself vertical right in front of me, with my hand still on his hilt, slightly higher than my forehead level. I needed no hint, I followed up quickly and placed my free hand on the flat just next to the point.

Right on time. A half transparent, multicolored orb flew, and then burst right onto twenty three's body.

_An attack of physically manifested 'aura' (shorthand term for a difficult to detect wave emitted by every living being). Pokemon capable of using such an attack? lucario and togekiss come to mind._

_Both of which are extremely dangerous._

"Excellent reaction speed twenty three."

He responds with a short chuckle.

A look at my opponent reveals a pokemon standing in front of the boy from earlier.

A bipedal creature covered in black, blue, and cream fur, with a vulpine head. Spikes erupted from his chest and palms. A lucario.

"Lucas! Another aura sphere!"

_'Aura sphere'?_

The lucario forms a blue sphere out of thin air in between it's palms that slowly expands.

_The formal, league classification name for a specific attack?_

The orb shoots at my direction at a dangerous speed.

_Only two kinds of trainers use those classifications..._

I disperse the incoming attack with a horizontal slash using twenty three. The orb breaks like superheated water in a spherical shape.

_Perfectionists and complete rookies._

The boy to my far end makes a face that suggests fear. The perceived sense of dread is compounded by his shrinking body language.

_Clearly, this boy is no perfectionist._

In one fluid motion, I unclip a pokeball from my belt, lightly toss it into the air, and then smack it away with the flat side of twenty three's body as if he was a baseball bat. The ball soars just behind the boy and breaks open.

Momentarily, the boy and his lucario turn to look behind.

I seize that moment of distraction to lob another pokeball forward and have it land right in front of the lucario's head just before breaking open.

_The force of an opening pokeball is comparable to that of a grenade's shockwave._

"Bind the human, pacify the lucario," I command.

Exactly 0.35 (rounded up) seconds after their instruction, number six (from behind the boy) produces vines from the round tip of his bell-shaped body to wrap around the boy, while number eleven bends each and every one of the lucario's limbs at wrong directions until four consecutive cracks are heard.

_The lucario does not scream, shows no signs of pain outside of restrained twitching._

_A well trained lucario in the hands of a complete rookie?_

While all this happened, I took my time to casually stroll towards the (then being bounded) boy with twenty three propped with my shoulder again.

_Image is important, morale is the backbone of every combat engagement._

_An image of intimidation, fabrications of a supposedly invincible opponent, does wonders to one's will to fight._

"Recall your lucario if you value his life," I said. Number six managed to catch my subtle command at him to leave gaps around his left hand to reach his lucario's pokeball.

_Left is usually the inferior, less dominant hand. Good of number six now that I no longer need to remind him_.

The boy looks at me with an expression that clearly suggests complete fear, but otherwise he does nothing.

_Frozen by fear? Overwhelmed?_

_Reassert your authority._

"Now, before I rip his heart out and feed you with it."

_Oof, too much._

_I should have stopped at 'rip his heart out'._

"Y-"

"Without words."

_Must not allow him any freedom of speech. At his age, with his mentality, no doubt he would burst into tears the second I give him the chance._

Silently, he recalls his lucario with rigid movements.

_He's shivering. And I think he may have wet himself._

_I could kill him now, feed him to number six as well, have him disappear without a trace._

_But there would no doubt be some evidence. Though nobody is around at the moment, someone might have witnessed him come towards here, a ranger might be able to track his footprints, I might have left DNA in the premises, and so on and so forth._

_But most of all..._

"Your name boy."

_Assertion of authority. The use of 'boy' suggests to him that he is my inferior._

"A..."

A pause, followed by a hiccup.

_He's going to cry._

_Nothing I can do will prevent it, it's a natural reaction to relieve stress._

He starts to cry. Starting with sniffles, and then slowly building into wailing_._

_At least he's aware of his situation. Some fools might have tried my patience by acting defiant._

_I calculate around 2-3 minutes before his crying recedes enough for me to ask questions and be able to receive coherent answers._

_Tch, so much for reaching the town by nightfall._

So I wait. I stand there without a word whilst the boy's wailing continue to fill the silence.

He was loud, frustratingly loud enough to catch attention. So with hand gestures, I commanded eleven to form a sound dampening barrier around all five of us, as well as have twenty three spread his ghostly presence to deflect curious wanderers.

_The mist that surrounds ghost types have a tendency to turn away other pokemon. Whether because the mist incites fear or some pungent scent I do not know. I just know that it is a useful piece of knowledge to have._

Occasionally, the boy's crying would cause a snort and twenty three would break into laughter. But aside from that, two minutes pass without anything noteworthy.

I deduce, at this point, that the boy is now capable of coherent speech.

"...Enough?"

"...Y-Yesh," he says with mild difficulty. Between the hiccups and the face full of snot, the difficulty was understandable.

"Now, I'll ask again; your name?"

"A-Aaron."

_No help there. A lot of people have that name,_

_But one in particular..._

"Your full name?"

"..."

_Silence? No,_

_Could he be aware of what I'm trying to do? If so, his silence would already be confirming my fears._

I point the tip of twenty three just short of his neck, right under his chin.

"Your full name. This is not a question."

"Aaron..." he trails off, clearly reluctant to finish that sentence.

"You are trying my patience boy. Name, now."

To push my point, I push twenty three forward. Just enough to break skin.

"G-Gardner! My name is Aaron Gardner!"

_Shit. **SHIT!**_

_Fantastic! Absolutely, positively-!_

_Damn damn damn damn damn!_

_I can't kill him now, I can't! It's too risky. If anyone finds out, if anything points to me as his murderer..._

_...Goddammit!_

_It had to be... It just **had **to be that monster's kid._

"You..."

_But I can't just let him go... He's seen my face, if a sketch of me starts flying around..._

_No, not just that. If that... thing, finds out I had so much as harmed him..._

_Dammit. More problems are piling up faster than I can solve them._

_No... maybe if I just... no, that wouldn't work._

_...I can't. I can't think of anything out of this fucked up situation._

"Tch."

_I just... I need to calm down. Keep a level head, maybe even sleep on the problem._

"P-Please.. I just wanna go h-home."

"Shut up."

_I've not enough patience for whining._

I hit him around the throat with twenty three's pommel. A hard enough shock at just the right place, sustained for just the right amount of time. The boy passes out.

"Six, carry him. No gastric juices, and don't swallow."

_If only he wasn't Lyra's kid._

**xxx**

**Bam.**

**That just happened.**

**Anyway.**

**This was an experiment for a new writing format I've been working on. _Italics _signify the narrator's inner thoughts or comments about stuff, and the non-italics signify actual stuff happening.**

**From here on out, twenty three's narrations will also follow the same format.**


End file.
